Lessons Taught By Miss Evers' Boys: The
Inadequacy Of Benevolence And The Need For Legal Protection Of Human
Subjects In Medical Research
, Donald H.J. Hermann

Journal of Law and Health

The Tuskegee study is perhaps the most notorious example of abuse in medical research in the United States. It is significant that the project was not ended until twenty-five years after the adoption of the Nuremberg Code of 1948, the first article of which establishes its principle that human subjects should not be experimented on without their consent. Continuing concern about the ethics of medical and scientific research have been fueled by finding about other research abuse such as the radiation experiments in the 1940's and 1950's that involved subjects being injected with plutonium without their knowledge and ...

Confronting Death: Who Chooses? Who Controls? A Dialogue Between Dax Cowart And Robert Burt, Robert A. Burt

Faculty Scholarship Series

On 21 November 1996, Dax Cowart and Robert Burt jointly delivered the Heather Koller Memorial Lecture at Pacific Lutheran University. This was the first time that they spoke together in a public forum. Dax Cowart now lives and practices law in Corpus Christi, Texas. In the summer of 1973, he was critically injured in a propane gas explosion that took his father's life and very deeply burned more than two-thirds of his own body. He was left blind and without the use of his hands. For more than a year Dax underwent extraordinarily painful treatments in the acute burn ...

Moral And Legal Issues Concerning Contemporary Human Cloning Technology : Quest For Regulatory Consensus In The International Community To Safeguard Rights And Liberties Essential To The Future Of Humanity, Ching-Pou Shih

Theses and Dissertations

The research topic for this dissertation would focus its efforts on resolving at least two questions as follows: First, what are the major moral and legal problems in current human cloning technology and what are the intelligent choices of public policy? Second, how could respective nations, regions, and the international community corporately clarify those problems in the realm of contemporary human dignity imperative and human rights jurisprudence.

Michigan Journal of Gender and Law

Disability law is one of the more successful tools currently being used to protect trans people fom discrimination. While the use of disability law as a framework for affirming or creating trans rights has come with some success, many in the community remain reluctant to use disability law for fear of the policy implications and stigma associated with medicalization of trans identity. After exploring the current state of the law on both the federal and state level, this Note will argue how disability law both could and should be used more often to further trans protections. In particular, this Note ...

Journal of Law and Health

This article will discuss the status of the privileges and confidentiality protection today at both the state and federal level. It will also address the concerns present among those individuals and organizations participating in peer review regarding the law of privileges and confidentiality and offer suggestions for health care providers to take full advantage of the statutory protections.

Michigan Journal of Gender and Law

If we slightly change the facts of the story about the discouraging doctor, it becomes a story that happens every day. Abortion patients face attempts to discourage them from terminating their pregnancies like those the imaginary doctor used, as well as others-and state laws mandate these attempts. While the law of every state requires health care professionals to secure the informed consent of the patient before any medical intervention, over half of the states place additional requirements on legally effective informed consent for abortion. These laws sometimes include features that have ethical problems, such as giving patients deceptive information. Unique ...

Articles

In the past decade, the existence of shaken baby syndrome (SBS) has been called into serious question by biomechanical studies, the medical and legal literature, and the media. As a result of these questions, SBS has been renamed abusive head trauma (AHT). This is, however, primarily a terminological shift: like SBS, AHT refers to the two-part hypothesis that one can reliably diagnose shaking or abuse from three internal findings (subdural hemorrhage, retinal hemorrhage, and encephalopathy) and that one can identify the perpetrator based on the onset of symptoms. Over the past decade, we have learned that this hypothesis fits poorly ...

University Policy And Procedural Responses To Students At Risk Of Suicide, Marlynn Wei

Student Scholarship Papers

Colleges and universities have recently faced several lawsuits brought by parents of students who have committed suicide or made suicide attempts. The lawsuits are based on varying claims, including negligence, breach of contact, and discrimination. In crafting policies to respond to these lawsuits, universities should not simply seek limiting institutional liability but should balance the private interest of their students, the relationship of the school to parents of the students, requirements of due process, and their commitment to antidiscrimination principles. This paper focuses on the current procedural protections in university policies handling students at risk of suicide. I argue that ...

Boston College Law Review

All Articles in Medical Jurisprudence

Can Dna Be Speech?, Jorge R. Roig

Jorge R Roig

DNA is generally regarded as the basic building block of life itself. In the most fundamental sense, DNA is nothing more than a chemical compound, albeit a very complex and peculiar one. DNA is an information-carrying molecule. The specific sequence of base pairs contained in a DNA molecule carries with it genetic information, and encodes for the creation of particular proteins. When taken as a whole, the DNA contained in a single human cell is a complete blueprint and instruction manual for the creation of that human being.

In this article we discuss myriad current and developing ways in which ...

Human Dignity As A Normative Standard Or As A Value In Global Health Care Decisionmaking?, George P. Smith

George P Smith

Abstract

Dignity is seen commonly as an ethical obligation owed to human persons. The dimensions of this obligation, in today’s post secular society, are—however—subject to wide discussion and debate; for, the term, human dignity, and its preservation, defies universal agreement. Yet its preservation, together with the prevention of indignity, is a guiding principle or at least a vector of force in a wide range of issues ranging from embryo research and assisted reproduction to biomedical enhancement, and the care of the disable and to the dying. In clinical medicine, safeguarding the dignity of the patient is a ...

The "Uberization" Of Healthcare: The Forthcoming Legal Storm Over Mobile Health Technology's Impact On The Medical Profession, Fazal Khan

Fazal Khan

The nascent field of mobile health technology is still very small but is predicted to grow exponentially as major technology companies such as Apple, Google, Samsung, and even Facebook have announced mobile health initiatives alongside influential healthcare provider networks. Given the highly regulated nature of healthcare, significant legal barriers stand in the way of mobile health’s potential ascension. I contend that the most difficult legal challenges facing this industry will be restrictive professional licensing and scope of practice laws. The primary reason is that mobile health threatens to disrupt historical power dynamics within the healthcare profession that have legally ...

barbara p billauer esq

Abstract:

The Daubert mantra demands that judges, acting as gatekeepers, prevent para, pseudo or bad science from infiltrating the courtroom. To do so, the Judges must first determine what is ‘science’ and what is ‘good science.’

It is submitted that Daubert is deeply polluted with the notions of Karl Popper who sets ‘falsifiability’ and ‘falsification’ as the demarcation line for that determination. This philosophy has intractably infected case law, leading to bad decisions immortalized as stare decisis, and an unworkable system of decision-making, which negatively impacts litigant expectations. Among other problems is the intolerance of Popper’s system for multiple ...

Western Journal of Legal Studies

This paper surveys leading and recent case law on disability with a specific focus on “non-mainstream” disabilities. Such disabilities are categorized according to the difficulty with which they can be medically diagnosed, their transient nature, and their fluctuations in severity. Jurisprudence on the duty to accommodate has been developed through what law professor Judith Mosoff classifies as “mainstream” disabilities. That is, disabilities that are better understood by employers and medical professionals, and to which the duty to accommodate more easily applies. In contrast, “non-mainstream” disabilities challenge the conventional understanding of the duty to accommodate. Standard accommodation practices do not necessarily ...

Piercing The Veil: The Limits Of Brain Death As A Legal Fiction, Seema K. Shah

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Brain death is different from the traditional, biological conception of death. Although there is no possibility of a meaningful recovery, considerable scientific evidence shows that neurological and other functions persist in patients accurately diagnosed as brain dead. Elsewhere with others, I have argued that brain death should be understood as an unacknowledged status legal fiction. A legal fiction arises when the law treats something as true, though it is known to be false or not known to be true, for a particular legal purpose (like the fiction that corporations are persons). Moving towards greater transparency, it is legally and ethically ...

A Guide To The Independent Medical Examination, Samuel D. Hodge Jr.

Samuel D. Hodge Jr.

Independent medical examinations (IMEs) are physicals conducted at the request of a third party. An example is the physical examination of a workers’ compensation claimant or life insurance applicant, but IMEs are common in bodily injury claims. These examinations are very important since they can help decide whether a claimant is entitled to compensation or qualifies for life insurance or a job. Most defense attorneys have relied on medical reports and expert testimony from an independent medical examiner but little is known about the limitations or parameters of this assessment. In fact, there are a multitude of legal issues surrounding ...

Indiana Law Journal

Obesity is a global epidemic, exacting an enormous human and economic toll. In the absence of a comprehensive global governance strategy, states have increasingly employed a wide array of legal strategies targeting the drivers of obesity. This Article identifies recent global trends in obesity-related legislation and makes the normative case for an updated global governance strategy.

National governments have responded to the epidemic both by strengthening traditional interventions and by developing novel legislative strategies. This response consists of nine important trends: (1) strengthened and tailored tax measures; (2) broadened use of counter-advertising and health campaigns; (3) expanded food labeling; (4 ...

University of Massachusetts Law Review

In the decades since the 1970s there have been several movements designed to impact or alter the workings of the legal system. The most lasting and widespread of these movements has been the development and systemic incorporation of mediation or Alternative Dispute Resolution, especially in the arena of family law but also impacting community disagreements, a variety of commercial disputes, and civil cases in general. However mediation did not significantly impact the practice of criminal law. Rapid growth in the number of individuals being processed through the criminal courts during the 1980s and 1990s shifted the focus to the criminal ...

Say Sorry And Save: A Practical Argument For A Greater Role For Apologies In Medical Malpractice Law, Matthew Pillsbury

University of Massachusetts Law Review

This article examines both the potential benefits and detriments of the use of an apology in a legal setting. This article uses the specific environment surrounding a medical malpractice case to help illustrate how and why an apology should or should not be proffered by the Defendant. Ultimately, the reader of this article should have a solid understanding of how an apology can be admissible as evidence in the litigation of a medical malpractice lawsuit.

On Apology, Robert Ward

University of Massachusetts Law Review

On February 16, 2006, Dr. Aaron Lazare, Dean and Chancellor of the University of Massachusetts Medical Center, addressed an assembly at the Southern New England School of Law on his critically acclaimed book entitled: “On Apology!” According to Dr. Lazare, to be an effective apology, there must be acknowledgement, remorse, explanation and reparation. Dr. Lazare advances the hypothesis that the current proliferation of cases in our legal system is predicated on the concept that often the aggrieved party was not the beneficiary of an effective apology. In the context of the patient-physician relationship, an effective apology means telling the patient ...

What Do The Philosophers Have Against Dignity?, Jeremy Waldron

New York University Public Law and Legal Theory Working Papers

Among analytic philosophers, there is considerable antipathy towards the concept of human dignity. It is not always expressed, but the impression is conveyed that this is a rather disreputable idea and that its trumpeting in legal and political theory is to be deplored. The present paper tries to get to grips with the sources of this antipathy. Is it based on the unclarity of the concept, its religious overtones, its speciesism, or its redundancy as a moral idea. The paper makes a case for dignity as a status-concept -- denoting a particular sort of moral/legal status that all humans have.

UC Irvine Law Review

Who's Swallowing The "Bitter Pill"?: Reforming Write-Offs In The State Of Washington, Lauren M. Martin

Seattle University Law Review

Washington’s application of the collateral source rule permits recovery for medical expenses that were never incurred and have no relationship to their market value. This application is set forth in Hayes v. Wieber Enterprises, Inc., where the plaintiff sued a restaurant for injuries she sustained from falling down the restaurant’s basement stairs. Why should the collateral source rule compel the defendant in Hayes to pay the original amount billed, $5,800, when the physician accepted $3,300 as payment in full? Is not $3,300 the reasonable or market value of the medical services provided to the plaintiff ...